Presented by Lauren Stibgen

For many women the creation story in Genesis feels like a story of their subordination to men. Afterall, God made Adam first. In Genesis 2:18, God says, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.” Out of everything in creation there was “not a helper found fit for him.” Different than everything in creation, even Adam, Eve was made from the rib of Adam. She was the only part of creation that was not formed from the ground.

While we are blessed with the details in Genesis 2, we learn in Genesis 1 that God created man “in our image, after our likeness.” Specifically in Genesis 1:27 it says, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” And in verse 28, “And God blessed them.”

Although God created Adam first and Eve specially for him, we forget this happened on the 6th day. There wasn’t some terrific lag in time, and there was certainly not a connotation of the woman being less. Both man and woman were created in Imago Dei—the image of God.

Genesis 2:18 is where we see the reference to “Ezer” or helper. As it is with many Bible translations, our definition of helper in English in not adequate to describe Ezer.

In the Oxford dictionary, we see help as a verb, noun and an exclamation. The verb help is defined as making it easier for someone to do something by offering services, or to serve someone with food or drink. The noun is the action of helping someone. And the exclamation—needing urgent assistance. All this insinuates assistance in some form or fashion.

Now, don’t get me wrong. God absolutely wants us to be this type of helper—and I will come back to this—but the definition and its connotations fail in comparison to the type of helper God made the first woman to be (and arguably every woman thereafter made in God’s image). If we know God is described as Jehovah Ezrah and we also know women are created to bare the image of God, we can begin to imagine just how significant it is to be an Ezer in the kingdom of God.

Unfortunately, after the fall in Genesis 4, the sin nature of man shifted to a dominating, patriarchal role, but this does not mean this is God’s plan for women and men! We know God is redeeming both men and women in his Kingdom through salvation in Christ Jesus, but we are still sinful. This, coupled with our poor English translation has created patterns in how we think of women and work that have made certain roles feel “less than”.

Culturally, the word helper has been used for roles that women would take to offer assistance. Teacher’s helper, Sunday school helper, lunchroom helper, field trip helper. Somewhere along the line we became more sophisticated and inserted the word chaperone, but helper was very prevalent. These roles in a classroom or at a school were reserved for stay-at-home moms. Women who worked could not find a place as this type of helper. While I think this is less pervasive today with more women at work, I know this is something many of the women in our ministry struggle with.

As working women, they often cannot be this type of helper, and they would like to be. Or perhaps they have a husband who fills the role of helper in this way. Men often face being one among many women still to this day. I know my husband is the primary teacher for our homeschooled son, and he is the only male hall helper in our homeschool cooperative.

Beyond these helper titles in settings that involve children, there are connotations surrounding titles that women hold at work. While some men are holding these titles today, we spent a lot of time making women “helpers” in the workforce. What do I mean by this? Assistants. These positions were held only by women. Honestly, what type of candidate pool of Administrative Assistant staff are men? Even today? Men make up on 11% of the administrative pool in the United States. Why the gender imbalance? Well,